Water-wheel bucket



(No Model.)

J. B. MCCORMICK. WATER WHEEL BUCKET.

No. 560,300 Y Patented May 19, 1896.

@31 aUoupeu Z Y I UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JOHN B. MCCORMICK, OF HOLYOKE, MASSACHUSETTS.

WATER-WHEEL BUCKET.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 560,300, dated May 19, 1896.

Application filed April 2, 1892. Serial No. 427,488- (No model.)

obtained from a turbine wheel, and especially at part-gate.

In order to obtain the highest possible percentage of useful result from the water admitted to a turbine wheel at part-gate, particularly when a cylinder-gate is used, it is.

essential that the buckets of said wheel be slightly curved transversely in a direction opposite to the forward motion of the wheel at the point where said buckets receive the water from the chutes, and it is also essential that means be provided for counteracting in some degree the tendency of the water to move upwardly or toward the top of the wheel as it enters the latter at part'gate. \Vith a view to securing this result wheels have heretofore been constructed having projecting from the rear side of the buckets wings or flanges arranged one above another, said wings or flanges being composed of solid metal. While the wheels thus constructed have obtained much better results than those which preceded them, Ihave discovered that they are themselves open to the objection that the solid wings or flanges, while counteracting the upward tendency of the water to some extent, also counteract the desired downward pressure of the water nearest the top of the wheel upon that which is below it in such manner as to lessen the possible total result to be obtained. I have found that all of the advantages obtainable from this form of buckets, without its attending disadvantages, can be secured by making the outer edge of the upper or receiving portion of the bucket in the form of a succession of shallow corrugations, and my invention therefore consists in a bucket of this nature, cona well-known manner.

structed and operated as hereinafterfully described, and particularly pointed out in the claim.

Referring to the drawings, in which like letters designate like parts in the several views, Figure 1 is an elevation of the rear side of the bucket devised by me. Fig. 2 is an outer edge view thereof. Fig. 3 shows two of the buckets secured to the wheel-hub.

The letter a designates the bucket, which has the usual flanged and curved upper edge and lugs Z) Z), by means of which the bucket is secured to its hub c by being cast thereto in p The bucket is also provided with the usual curved discharge portion (1 at the bottom, or may have any of the conformations at the bottom with which turbine-wheel buckets have heretofore been provided. The portion of the bucket which is affected by my present invention is the outer edge thereof or the portion between the points 1 and 2. In the practice of the invention I make said outer edge in the form of a series of corrugations, which, as shown, are four in number, and are designated by the letter 6. The number of said corrugations will be governed by the size of the wheel, two being a sufficient number for a very small wheel, and their particular outline vertically can be varied slightly without departure from the broader feature of my invention.

As shown, each of the corrugations e is made vertical from the bottom thereof to the point indicated by the broken line w, or for substantially five-eighths of its height, and extends from said point to the top thereof by an easy curve to the rearward or in a direction opposite to the forward movement of the wheel, andthe vertical plane of each corrugation from the bottom one upward lies slightly to the rear of the one beneathit, as clearly shown in Fig. 2, thereby causing the vertical plane of the extreme top of said outer edge of the bucket to lie considerably to the rear of the plane of the bottom thereof. It being borne in mind that said edge of the bucket between the points 1 2 is the portion which first receives the impulse of the water when the cylinder-gate is raised, it will be obvious that, constructed as described, the curved upper portion of the corrugations e will successively resist the tendency of the entering streams of water to pass upwardly within the wheel in much the same manner as the wings or flanges hereinbefore referred to, while it will be equally obvious that the vertical lower portion of said corrugations will permit the, water contained in the higher corrugations to exert its entire weight upon and to pass downwardly freely with the Water in the corrugations beneath them instead of being ob-' structed and diverted as it is by said wings or flanges.

but not downwardly, and I am thereby enabled to gain the useful eifect of all of the water which passes through the wheel and secure a higher percentage of result than has hitherto been possible. At part-gate this difference in result obtained is more marked th an at f ullgate, inasmuch as thetendency and ability of the water to pass upwardly within the wheel after passing beneath the gate is greater at part-gate than at. full-gate. Such increase of percentage of result at part-gate is of great corrugations also can be varied from those In other words, the corrugations c obstruct the passage of the water upwardly shown without materially affecting this result.

While I have described the use of the buckets thus constructed in connection with a cylinder-gate, I do not thereby mean to imply that its use is restricted thereto, for while its action is particularly advantageous when such a gate is employed Ibelieve it to be capable of producing with a register-gate better results than have been possible withbuckets as heretofore constructed and for the reason that even though the water be admitted at once to the entire outer edge of the buckets, as is usually the case with register-gates, the corrugated edge of the buckets causes both the tangential impulse and the downward pressure of the water to be directly exerted upon the buckets ina manner to utilize all of the energy of the water.

Having thus fully described my invention, what I claim, and desire to secure byLetters Patent, is-

The bucket forturbine water-wheels herein described having the outer edge of its upper or receiving portion, between the points 1 2, composed of thecorrugations 6, each of which corrugations extends from its bottom upwardly in a straight line for substantially five- 

